Bylined opinion and news columns published by United Hebrew Congregation Terre Haute.
Spring is a season of transition: Pesach is just behind us, we’ve switched from praying for rain to praying for dew, and we engage in the practice of s’firat ha-omer, counting the Omer.
Pesach is our foundation for this season of transition where we personally and communally experience the transition from slavery to freedom.
That freedom, then, sets us out on our journey to true transformation.
As active as our congregation remained during the period of Zoom-only, and then hybrid worship, we hadn’t held a large social gathering since Purim in March 2020.
That changed April 23 with our Passover Celebration in the Vestry Room at the Temple.
More than 20 people attended in person and more attended online. As United Hebrew Congregation moves forward from the pandemic, we have learned more than ever that we can be engaged in multiple ways.
Every spring, we gather to retell the story of our ancestors’ liberation from slavery in Egypt.
We are reminded that our ancestors cried out to God in their suffering and were freed through a series of miracles and wonders performed by God through Moses.
But the story doesn’t end when our seder ends, does it?
As I prepared to give a talk for Women’s History Month at Indiana State University on the two women who received the Nobel Prize in Economics, Elinor Ostrom and Esther Duflo, I also reflected on a memoir I read a few years ago by the economist Myra Strober.
Strober’s memoir Sharing the Work: What My Family and Career Taught Me about Breaking Through (and Holding the Door Open for Others) tells of her experiences earning her PhD in Economics during the late ’60s at MIT, at a time when even fewer women worked in the field.